Tonight is another meeting of the Council’s Internal Scrutiny committee. Its name might induce sniggers in the occasional teenage boy, but its purpose is more serious. It is the only body scrutinising the work of the Council’s Cabinet, which is the group of top Councillors running Bury.

There’s a new system of scrutiny in Bury this year, and I don’t think it’s working very well at the moment. The way it should work is that the Cabinet make decisions which affect Bury, and we get to take a look at them after, or preferably before, they’ve been taken to ensure that everything is being done properly and in the interests if Bury. Obviously we might disagree with the end decision, and it’s not necessarily about changing it, but it is certainly about giving Councillors of all political views a say.

Until last year there were about 5 scrutiny panels. They looked at lots of interesting, but often irrelevant, things. Now there’s just one, which is supposed to look at fewer things, all of them important.

Sadly, the change in arrangements has coincided with the new “Strong Leader” model for the Council, which has changed the way that the Cabinet makes decisions. As a result, in the three months which we are to scrutinise tonight, only a handful of decisions have apparently been made, very few of them important.

Hopefully tonight we will discuss ways to improve the situation, as it’s evidently not right that the Cabinet have made so few decisions when, in reality, the Council is doing lots which affects the borough, like making big financial decisions about cuts.

I am looking forward to our discussion tonight and to ways of improving the situation. If you’ve really nothing better to do and don’t want to watch the last ever episode of The Bill, you can watch the drama unfold, as the meeting is open to the public and free to attend! At the Town Hall, tonight at 7!

Rick